Saturday, December 27, 2008

On the sixth day of our trip Hannah and I checked into Ban's Diving Resort on the other side of Ko Tao. Ban's was highly recommended to me by my buddy/blog fan Steve who took a dive course with Ban's a couple months ago. Hannah and I were originally going to take a course with Ban's too (Hannah to get her open water and me to get my advanced) but we opted not too. I'm glad we made this decision because frankly, the diving wasn't that good. I'm sure normally the diving on Ko Tao is great but the visibility this month was terrible. Out of all the dives I've ever done, these two were probably the worst.

Hannah was battling a cold and I told her she couldn't dive. Rule 1 in diving is not to dive if you're congested or sick. Hannah didn't put up a fight and decided to snorkel instead. She came out on the dive boat with me and went snorkeling while I was under water. She was also disappointed with the visibility and marine life and after freezing our butts off on the boat after, we decided to hit the mainland the next day.

That said, this blog entry isn't about the cold water in Ko Tao. This blog entry is about the cold water everywhere in Thailand. Besides our first night here, we haven't had hot water once in our hotels/guest houses/bungalows. For those of you who know my sister well, she isn't exactly a fan of showering. It's not so much that she opposes being clean but hates when her hair gets really wet since it takes forever to dry. Up until this night at Ban's, Hannah had only showered once (REMINDER: WE'RE ON A HOT SWEATY TROPICAL ISLAND!).

After going in the salt water, Hannah's hair was already wet so she sucked it up and decided to shower at the hotel. Once we were both ready we went and watched another gorgeous sunset. This one was highlighted by a stray dog trying to catch fish in the water. After the sunset, Hannah and I went for a walk along the beach to find a restaurant. While strolling, I noticed something strange: a thousand bugs were flying above Hannah's head. There were no bugs anywhere else except above Hannah's head. I pointed this out to Hannah and she said it must be the gel in her hair. She tried to shake the bugs by sprinting along the beach. I'd say she lost roughly half of them. The sad news is that this really just gave Hannah a reason NOT TO SHOWER AGAIN. It's been a week since that night...and no shower (although Hannah claims rinsing in a waterfall we went to counts!).

(PICTURE: A pretty picture of a dog trying to catch a fish at sunset. Oddly, this dog had less bugs on it than Hannah.)